Mad Men Season FIVE is Almost Upon Us: Let's Make Predictions!

I can’t even remember Don Draper’s bedroom eyes anymore. It has been nearly a year and a half since I last saw him and I’m beginning to forget his face. It has gotten so bad that when I try to picture Don Draper, his face melts into Cousin Matthew from "Downton Abbey."

Though I loved Downton, This is just plain wrong and an indication of just how badly I need "Mad Men" to come back this month. After the so-happy-it-was-nearly-animated ending to Downton, I’m ready to put some highly staged realism back in my life. I want some characters with real flaws that have real sex. I’m ready for Mad Men.

I like picturing Don Draper paying a visit to Downton. He would have no patience for Matthew's self-percieved virtuosity. I can even picture Don staring him down with that furrowed brow, curled lip look he uses to convey to someone that he or she is the most naïve and stupid person he’s ever seen. “You honor means nothing," he’d tell Matthew. Then Don would say something slightly rude to Mary and they would have hot sex right where the Turkish dude died.

For the past four seasons, the show has premiered in the fall and so I associate it with the coming of the cold, with whiskey drinks and crisp low lit days and the quiet introspection of winter. Now it will premiere in spring, perhaps giving it whole different atmosphere? One less dark and more hopeful? The last season did end with a proposal. Actually, let’s look back at how season four ended.

When last we left off:

Don took a trip to Disney with Megan his secretary and was so impressed that she could sing in French and didn’t abuse his children over a spilt milkshake that he proposed. He returned victorious to New York where he showed off his new bride to the office (resulting in one of the funniest ever scenes of dialogue between Joan and Peggy).

Meanwhile, after firing the maid Carla, Betty is truly losing her shit “Yellow Wallpaper” style. Is it just me or does Henry Francis look a tiny bit sexy when he drinks beer in the dark? “Nobody’s on your side Betty.”

Sally is the dark horse. Subsisting on her parent’s pathetic trickle of love has turned her into either and artist or a monster, we’ll have to wait to find out which. Her brother Bobby is of little consequence plot-wise (I had to Google his name) but that could change as the years pass. (Though I kind of hope not. I have a one-child policy when it comes to plotlines.)

Over at the Office of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce:

Having ducked Duck Phillips, Peggy has gotten quite sassy both in look and attitude and is dating the cute indie guy who wrote her the note. I have high hopes for her even though she seems to be harboring some latent sexual desires for Don. Not that one could blame her.

Joan Holloway (née Harris) is pregnant with Roger Sterling’s baby, which I somehow love even though her husband, who is off fighting in Vietnam, is seeming like less of a control-freak asshole than he did in season three. I hope Roger divorces his bratty wife soon and stops drinking so much.

Pete Campbell has managed to become mildly likeable recently, sort of like that ex-boyfriend who you don’t quite trust but still feel affection for. He and Trudy seem to be doing better despite some confusion on the baby front and are now planning on adopting.

Harry Crane and Ken Cosgrove are busy being cute and mostly inconsequential. What else?

Oh, I have a sneaking suspicion we haven’t seen the last of Faye, the woman who Don cast aside for the secretary after confessing his deepest secrets to her. Will she come back for revenge? I seem to remember something about a daddy with connections to the mob.

So what are your predictions for this season? Will Don marry the secretary? Apparently the show’s creator Matthew Weiner pointed out that Don is not married yet. So perhaps we should take that into consideration.

Will Peggy take over the world? Will Roger kill himself now that he has written his memoirs? What world events will shake up the plot?